Thread by @gelliottmorris

Banning the publication and circulation of a book is very different from the copyright owner voluntarily withdrawing the book from the press, with very different implications for censorship or “disappearing” materials. Weird that otherwise, smart people are just... ignoring this

https://twitter.com/douthatnyt/status/1368570916171620356

By the way, it’s plausible that Geisel would have done this himself years ago, given how much he regretted drawing racist caricatures of Japanese people during their forced internment throughout WWII. Surely that adds a wrinkle to the story that makes this different from Lolita?

I think a good critique of stuff like this, besides that the outrage is manufactured for clicks or whatever, is that many people obsessed with overblown cultural threats to liberalism seem to not care at all about very pressing electoral threats to popular sovereignty in America.

If you’re writing more about Dr Seuss than competitive authoritarianism and minority rule, I think you’re being motivated by other things that just a stalwart defense of the liberal order — worth asking yourself what those things might be